Autumn days

I love these lovely sunny days that Autumn often brings. It is quite cool in the morning but the sun streams into  my house almost all day long. I love this feature and designed the house to have appropriate shade during summer but allow the rays to penetrate at this time of year. During winter the sun streams in the family/lounge room almost to the kitchen and warms both the tiles and my spirits.
Normally, with a hot summer, I find some deciduous trees drop their leaves prematurely due to water stress. But this year the trees are only starting to drop their beautiful brown, gold and red leaves. I was in Oakleigh recently and the streets are just starting to have piles of brown leaves from some of the mature Oak Trees.
My Ginkgo tree is just turning gold and the Magnolia just browning off.
The weeds have been getting away from me but at least the main vegie garden has been dug over just waiting for the compost and organic manure to be added. Then its time to plant the winter crops of cauliflower, broccoli, asian greens, peas and broad beans. In fact I might just be a bit late!
Once this is done I'll have more time for reading all these interesting reports on climate change, carbon tax, literacy and even the odd fiction title "Time machines repaired, while u wait" by K. A. Bedford.

Autumn colours

I was sweeping the fallen leaves from my deciduous trees recently and noticed again their beautiful colours - golden browns and yellows. The oak trees nearby have had dark red colour for a long time, possibly starting the colours earlier due to the harsh summer this year. One of my Silver Birch trees dropped most of its leaves in the ferocious heat and hasn't recovered any since then. It is now almost bare unlike the other one nearby. The native trees nearby are looking much the same except for several Illawarra Flame trees that are vibrantly scarlet with their stange flowers.
I was walking in the Cranbourne Botanic gardens the other day and noticed the bush was looking somewhat bedraggled also. The Botanic gardens are located on a sand plain and had been extensively disturbed before being aquired as the Australian gardens part of the Melbourne Botanic Gardens. I haven't been there for a while and remember more shrubs and trees. Some of the taller vegetation had black trunks, presumably from burning fairly recently. I didn't hear as many bird calls either or. When I got back from my walk I noticed a large Southern Brown Bandicoot ( I presume) next to my car. Once I saw this animal I noticed several more. Perhaps they are coming out of the bush onto the paths and roads more frequently to look for food now that autumn is here. I was surprised by how small his tail was in comparison to other similar animals.